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Comment by gonzo41 | Hacker News Reader

I think millennials and zoomers know they've on their own. It'll be less of a shock.

I also plan to work until the grave. I don't see any other way.

Same here, I got to watch my dad burn though his retirement nest egg at an astonishing rate once he fell Ill and needed long term care. Started out at only $3800/m for assisted living and ended up at $11,000/m in a nursing home. This was by far the most stressful period of of both our lives. You will need much more money to retire than you realise unless you stay in good health or die young.

I intend on going the suicide route if my only other option was being such a burden, financial or otherwise, to my next of kin. But you’re right, it’s a common fate for the would-be inheritance. It was around $10k/month for one set of grandparents, and as much as it sucks that they’re gone, there’s a sense of relief across the family that they didn’t live another, you know, 5 or 10 years ($600k-1.2M)

Yeah, I don’t think inheritance is gonna be much of a thing anymore below the top percent or two of estates.

The rest of us are just temporarily holding the healthcare industry’s money, when we save. Including most Boomers.

I'm already doing that.

retirement is really depressing. No matter how I look at it, there is no way the markets could generate enough returns for give everyone the 7-8% they would need.

>No matter how I look at it, there is no way the markets could generate enough returns for give everyone the 7-8% they would need.

The markets can easily generate 7-8% returns, but you are right it won't be enough for what people need, when the cost of living (rather than the phony CPI number that is bandied about) is rising at more than 8% a year.

I will agree with you that the market can generate 7-8% returns for a certain volume of cash infusion through 401(k)s. but what happened if everybody participates?

I'll spare you the back of the envelope calculation with but if everybody saved 10% of their income to a 401k, it looks like we would have approximately $24 trillion that would need to get that 7-8% return. FWIW,the current 401(k) number 7 trillion. The current stock market size is 46 trillion so where would that money go?

feel free to come up with your own numbers, as professors have told me, more accurate calculations are left as an exercise to the reader.

I suspect that the vast majority of people would stick their money into robot funds and cause the value of the stock market to inflate to unsustainable levels because as we know, stock prices have nothing to do with reality.

Anyway, this calculation is interesting exercise and shows how people really haven't thought through the true cost of retirement and the impact it has on the financial system.

Watching the boomers go through retirement looks quite boring, but they do have different life interests.

That's not what it is about. It's about the agency of not having to work if you don't want to or cannot. Aging with health issues and needing to still work is a scary concept.

I'd happily take "boring" at that age over "work stress".

Boring will mean your brain will also decay much faster.

That's their problem if they chose that kind of boring.

My parents both turn 74 this year - and both are still working. Not sure when they plan to retire. My mother works as a doctor, my father as a pharmaceutical industry management consultant

Either your mom really enjoys her work (doubtful if she’s a doc in the US- they hospital administration seems to ruin that career), or she’s calculated she needs every penny she can get while she is able to work.

Ah yes, and when they do retire there will be no one to take their place..

The grave is my retirement plan

At least in Australia they will be fine. 11% of your income is taken before you receive it and put in to retirement funds. It’s also taxed at a much lower rate.

To end up at retirement age without any savings accumulated, you’d have to either have been unemployed for your whole life, or run a business/be self employed and never make any contributions to retirement savings.

That's funny if you believe that money will still be there for you. That money is paying for those retired now. It's not like that money is in an account with your name on it. It's just a note in a ledger that says you're "owed" that money. Good luck collecting it. Truly.

Edit: missed the relevant Australian bit. makes a big difference to grok the full comment when deciding to reply to it

No, that's exactly how it works in Australia - a compulsory tax advantaged managed investment account for the individual. There is a separate social security-type (pension) scheme that may or may not still exist for future generations, but superannuation is very much your own asset.

That's the old system, I had a choice of staying with the "old" system or moving to the superannuation scheme. My older (read: then about to retire) colleagues told me I HAD TO move to the "new" system, as by the time they retired and took out their money, there would be no money left in the "old" system for me.

It is in an account with their name on it. If the government of Australia wanted to use the money for something, it would be the same as taking money from people's bank accounts.

It is a savings system, not taxation.

NZ has a similar (but shit in comparison) system.

It literally is in an account with your name on it.

The Australian system is one of the more sensible ones in the developed world. One could quibble about the details of implementation but I think many countries would do well to emulate it, including the US.

I worked for several years in OZ and amassed a 6 figure super. Thanks to the greedy super fund companies and several economic downturns,that 6 figure sum is now 5 figures. Sigh.

If you're never coming back, you can get it out. You should contact your fund.

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